Round 4 Feature Match - Ken Yukihiro vs. Bin Jia

by Pip Foweraker

Ken Yukuhiro arrives in Shanghai fresh off a Top 4 finish at Pro Tour X, and has two GP Top 8's to his name. Bin Jia is a well-known player from Beijing who has made the Top 8 of Chinese Nationals 3 times.

Another Dragon hit the board for Jia, this time a Whelp. Jia attacked with both his fliers, and Yukuhiro Murdered the Whelp. On his turn, he summoned a Duty-Bound Dead and attacked with his Chronomaton, knocking Jia to 13 in one blow.

Mark of the Vampire on the Chronomaton meant that Yukuhiro was able to gain 11 points of life in one swing, tilting the board firmly in his favour. A double Murder from Yukuhiro cleared the way for the final swing, and the Little Robot That Could trundled in to take the first game.

How could he rebuild? He had a hand full of cards and needed to play some. Play he did, summoning a Augur of Bolas, which found a Murder. Yukuhiro played a Mark of the Vampire on the Augur, tapping himself out. Jia cracked a Hellion Crucible and attacked with his team, putting Yukuhiro to 1.

Yukuhiro mounted a valiant defence, using his Murders and Archaeomancers to stave off Jia's attacks. Eventually, Jia found a Turn to Slag, which was enough to blast the Augur out of the way and attack for that vital, final point of damage.

Bin Jia 1 – Ken Yukuhiro 1

Game 3

The deciding game can be best described by listing three permanents in play at the end of the game. Two of them were Jia's only lands – a Swamp and a Mountain. The other was Yukuhiro's Akroma's Memorial.

Ken Yukuhiro 2 – Bin Jia 1

Saturday, 5:58 p.m. - Metagame Breakdown

by Chapman Sim

I'm happy to be still alive after an hour of number-crunching and data-logging, and I sure do hope you enjoy looking at statistics! 836 people can't be wrong and the first thing you need to know is that it is NOT advised to play with only one color in the world of M13 Sealed Deck.

The question remains whether we should stick with two colors, or splash a third one.

Colors

Number Played

Splash White

Splash Blue

Splash Black

Splash Red

Splash Green

White Blue

44

12

5

5

Blue Black

51

13

4

7

Black Red

54

3

18

3

Red Green

65

19

3

12

Green White

78

10

18

35

White Black

102

7

9

4

Blue Red

14

7

5

2

Black Green

60

27

6

21

Red White

34

4

4

4

Green Blue

25

10

11

14

4 Color Decks

7

Mono Colored Decks

0

836 Decks

Heralded by pros (like Yuuya Watanabe and Kuo Tzu Ching) as the preferred color combination, this color pair owes his power to its high density of bombs, removal and (to a lesser extent) quality Exalted and evasive creatures which conveniently play very well together. 40% of the field chose to cast their cards using Plains, closely followed by Swamps. Blue seemed to have gotten the shaft this time, where only 22% of all participants chose to play with any blue cards at all.

Color

Players playing this color as a main color

% of field

White

337

40%

Blue

182

22%

Black

329

39%

Red

255

31%

Green

253

30%

Out of the remaining players, 302 (36%) chose to splash an additional color, going up to three and sporting slightly awkward manabases like the infamous 666 (since the Invasion Block days) or the more favored 772E, where the alphabet represents Evolving Wilds, the most important land to look out for in the current format. Trying to cram as many goodies as possible into a deck of forty is not only viable, but also strategic and immensely-rewarding if utilized with care.

On the topic of splashes, the favorite color of choice was red, possibly due to the fact that efficient removal like Searing Spear and Flames of the Firebrand (as well as quality sideboard material like Chandra's Fury and Volcanic Strength) are prized in this format. 35 White Green players chose to supplement their strategy with fire, in order to clear the path for their swarm of attackers or to give their otherwise "burnless" decks some reach to finish off opponents at low life totals. White was also a great choice amongst the greedier players, since Oblivion Ring, Pacifism and Divine Verdict are generally efficient against bomb creatures and similarly easy to splash.

Color

Players splashing this color

% of field

White

79

9%

Blue

48

6%

Black

62

7%

Red

88

11%

Green

25

3%

Interestingly, some players have even gone to the extent of running one Island (despite not playing any blue cards) just to clinch a free land from Gem of Becoming! Nicol Bolas would be proud!

Round 5 Feature Match - Zhang Zhiyang vs. Abe Motoki

by Chapman Sim

Local hero Zhang Zhiyang has built a blue green deck loaded with various goodies and has even dipped into red to enhance his deck's power. Double Switcheroo allowed him to steal his opponent's bombs, or he could try to end the game quickly with some of his own, including Sphinx of Uthuum. Abe Motoki had a relatively different approach though, and preferred to use a combination of efficient creatures (with or without exalted) and removal to achieve victory quickly.

Phyrexian Hulk entered play next turn but Zhang was ready with yet another Switcheroo, this time "gifting" Abe a relatively useless 1/1 Arbor Elf. Possibly playing around Essence Drain, Zhang pushed the 5/4 Hulk in Giant Scorpion's way when Abe attacked with it. With the situation now out of control, Abe decided to hit the emergency button, and reset the board with Planar Cleansing. Zhang simply rebuilt with Vastwood Gorger and Sphinx of Uthuum to eventually take over the game with the immense advantage.

Zhang wasn't going to let him recover, and attacked with everything he had. His army comprised of three elves (2 Elvish Visionary and 1 Arbor Elf), three soldier tokens and Griffin Protector. Zhang might have lost two critters from that, but it did reduce Abe to a life total that was within reach.

Bloodhunter Bat granted Abe some life but when Zhang attacked once more and he declined to block, Abe went down to just 4 life. When he attached Mark of the Vampire on Bloodhunter Bat and turned it sideways, Zhang trumped that combat step with Fog to nullify the life-gain and take the match in style!

Game 2

Kuo had the first play with a Wind Drake, while Huang played a series of lands but had little other action. Kuo looked at Huang's 4 untapped lands and gently summoned a Sentinel Spider, preemptively placing it in the graveyard... But, with a wry grin, Huang motioned for the Spider to live.

Despite his fervent wishes, Huang finds himself sitting on the wrong side of the battlefield.

Round 7 Feature Match - Li Bo vs. Lv Jiachong

by Chapman Sim

Li Bo and Lv Jiachong are considered big names within the local gaming community, but both were greenhorns when it came to Grand Prix Featured Matches. Li has played under the Sunday spotlight when he clinched the World Championships Team trophy back in 2009, but has never been summoned to the Featured Match area of a Grand Prix until today.

His opponent, Lv Jiachong is no slouch either and has had two successive Nationals Top 4 appearances in 2010 and 2011. Both friends exchanged friendly banter, briefly commenting that they wanted more bombs, before tossing the dice to determine who would play first.

Essence Drain did its job by removing the opposing legendary creature, but Lv was facing an army while having no creatures on board. Fortunately for him, he was not without a plan and threw out Knight of Infamy and Ajani Sunstriker to block, buying him just enough time to reach six mana so he could clear the board with Planar Cleansing.

Li could only summon Arms Dealer and point Turn to Slag on a re-recruited Griffin Protector, but he could only twiddle his thumbs because he was out of gas. Lv tried to end the game before his opponent could draw something significant but his clock was unimpressive initially.

Saturday, 8:22 p.m. - Sealed Deckbuilding with Sui Xin

by Chapman Sim

Sui Xin

"My deck is all trash!"

Taking a quick glance at his card pool, it was not hard to see why Sui Xin had such an exclamation. Firstly, I saw him flip the top card of his deck away (a foil Swamp), which meant that he had one less card to work with.

Sui started to sift through his cards and was quick to set aside his ten white cards (awfully disproportionate to the standard deck size of 84) and green was also next to go.

It seemed like he had a bunch of solid black cards, including Xanthrid Gorgon and a pair of Rise from the Grave to ensure "Medusa's" eternal existence. He had two of each of Duty-bound Skeleton and Servant of Nefarox (as well as Duskmantle Prowler), which meant that he had no problem attacking if he needed to. While it was obvious that he had solidified himself in black, he seemed to face some difficulty while trying to find a secondary (or tertiary) support color.

With only approximately twenty black, blue and artifact cards, Sui had to find a third color to fill out the rest of his deck. He had the Evolving Wilds everyone looks out for and was able to comfortably splash double Searing Spear and Flames of the Firebrand. Cathedral of War would have to sit in the sideboard, to minimize mana complications.

All in all, he says that he has a great deck, and has potential to go undefeated, although a score of 8-1 would not disappoint. He commented that the sideboard plan is quite important in this format and has an assortment of cards which can get him out out any situation.

Saturday, 8:25 p.m. - Quick Questions: Do you choose to play or choose to draw in M13 sealed?

by Chapman Sim and Pip Foweraker

Shouta Yasooka: "Draw!"

Shuhei Nakamura: "60-70% of the time, play."

Kuo Tzu Ching: "2 color, I play. 3 color, I draw."

Ken Yukuhiro: "Always play!"

Huang Hao-shan: "Always play when aggro and draw when control."

Lv Jiachong: "Play!"

Round 8 Feature Match - Yoshihiko Ikawa vs. Xin Sui

by Pip Foweraker

Game 1

Ikawa led play with a Farseek after Sui mulliganed to 6. Ikawa summoned a Canyon Centaur, which Sui killed with a Searing Spear. Sui cast a Sands Of Delirium, while Ikawa had a second Farseek but no further plays.

"Yes, I only have the one creature. What of it?"

An Elderscale Wurm from Ikawa hit the board with a resounding thump. After that, the game turned into a race: milling vs. attacking. On Sui's side – an Elixir of Immortality and a few small creatures. On Ikawa's – one GIGANTOSAURIFFIC WURM. Ikawa wasn't in a marathon mood, though, and put on a final sprint with a massive Volcanic Geyser, sending both players to their sideboards.

Round 9 Feature Match - Yuuya Watanabe vs. Chen Hujian

by Chapman Sim

Yuuya Watanabe was off to a rough start this weekend and has had to battle his past few rounds as bubble matches. This would be his very last of the day, and a victory here would grant him the privilege of hitting the draft tables tomorrow. A loss here would result in a very depressed Grand Prix Shanghai defending Champion. Relatively unknown local Chen Hujian wanted very much to clinch that spot himself and would have to put up his best fight if he wanted to deny the "Core Set" master entry into Day Two.

Bond Beetle enhanced the Goblin token one step further, but Watanabe simply blocked with Duty-bound Skeleton (regenerating it) to absorb two of the incoming damage. When a 4/4 Crusader of Odric crashed into the red zone, Bond Beetle stood in the way now that it had done its deed.

Still stuck on his fourth land, Watanabe could only summon Shimian Specter, while watching a 5/3 trampling Chronomaton crash in. He pushed both his 2/2 creatures (including Silvercoat Lion) in front of it, reducing his once-formidable army to just a lonely Duty-bound Dead.

The real race began when Chen summoned Nefarox, Overlord of Grixis, threatening to annihilate the opposite army. Watanabe tried to preserve his population and maintain his board with sacrificial fodder in the form of Captain's Call.

A timely Mark of the Vampire on Attended Knight allowed Watanabe to stay ahead in terms of the damage race. Three turns of exchanging damage and chump-blocking ensued, and both players were eventually left with nothing more than their respective monsters.

Watanabe's next play prompted some "oohs and ahhs" from the crowd, when he used his own copy of Nefarox to kill his opponent's legendary copy, something that has never happened in the history of Core Set Magic until M13 hit the shelves.

Chen was ready with Rise from the Grave to undo that maneuver, but it seemed that all was lost. Losing an attack phase and forced to take another hit, Chen was down to just four life. A second copy of Crippling Blight as well as Serra Angel was enough to tip the balances, and prompted Chen to extend his hand graciously.